


The Written Word

by Engelikal



Series: A Slippery (Trope) Slope [1]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Ambiguous Relationships, Because of Reasons, Darker takes on this trope are my oxygen, Dragon Age Lore, Gen, Multi, Platonic Soulmates, Platonic takes on romantic tropes, Soulmate AU, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Suspicously absent Warden, Tropes vs Lore, blink and you miss it - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-11
Updated: 2016-08-11
Packaged: 2018-08-08 04:54:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 949
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7744111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Engelikal/pseuds/Engelikal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Soulmate Identifying Mark AU where you have your Soulmate’s name on your arm but only you and your Soulmate can see it.</p><p>Quick paragraphs for every DA:O companion so I could play with adapting a common trope to the DA lore.  Also because I play with this AU too much in my head to continue keeping it there.</p><p>(Currently, I’m content to stop at the DA:O companions.  But if I ever wanna spend another few more minutes playing in this Universe, I might add more.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Written Word

Alistair's name was a comfort to him in the early years of his life.  He was the unwanted Bastard (as if there were any other kind) of a King.  A thing that nobody **wanted,** yet one that could not be completely disposed of.  He was sent away once to his Uncle, then again to the Templar Order.  He spent a long time tracing his name, memorizing every contour, mouthing the name: “Morrigan”.

 

. . .

 

Morrigan knows the truth.  She knows that these Names are not what people believe them to be.  They are an old magic.  Bastardized old magic, but old magic nonetheless.  The main benefit of growing up as Flemmeth’s daughter, as it happens, is the knowledge and understanding of old magic.  

 

She does not know the entirety of the story, suspects that it is hidden away somewhere in her mother’s grimoire, but she knows that those who walked this World did not always carry these marks on them.  Some rift was torn down long ago that severed the balance between this place and that _(or perhaps: something quite the opposite, but that knowledge would come later)_.  The dark ink marring everyone’s skin bled in after.  Morrigan knows that this new system is merely--somehow--a perversion of the old ways.  She keeps her arms covered.

 

When she sees Alistair’s right forearm, laid bare one night as the fool stands outside of her tent, struggling to string together a coherent thought…

 

Nothing changes.

 

. . .

 

Leliana is a romantic.  As a girl, she _believed_ her Name would come to her, perhaps riding a white horse and trailing satin ribbons on an equally opulent gown.  After she became a bard--after she met Marjoline and fell for her--she _believed_ it did not really matter.  After she was betrayed by Marjoline, she met the woman behind the Name that had always been there-- _Dorothea_ \--and **truly** started believing.

 

. . .

 

Sten has no physical evidence of what the Bas call a “Soul Name” (and the Qun calls nothing), not even in his own eyes.

 

He has one.

 

He feels the answering thrum of another in his blood, but it does not show on his skin.

 

For some, this Name will align with the breeding partner assigned to them by the Tamassran.  For some, it will not.

 

When the time comes, Sten will accept the Tamassran’s choice either way.  

 

That is all he need know.  

 

. . .

 

Wynne is an old woman.  She accepts the world and its failings.

 

She loved a man once.  A Templar.

 

She does not know if the name that once scarred her body coincides with the one that now scars her heart.

 

All apprentices of the Circles of Magi--in Ferelden and many other places--have their names magically warded.  When she looks at her arm she sees only a silvery scar, powered by her own Mana.  She could not read before she began her studies in the Circle. She does not know what it once said.  On the few occasions when she thinks of it any more, all she can remember is a collection of then-nonsensical scribbles.

 

She remembers thinking that they painted the most beautiful picture she had ever seen.

 

Like many things, she has learned to let it go.

 

. . .

 

Loghain’s Name was Maric.

 

The love between them was not romantic, but Loghain carries the weight of Maric's name--of Maric’s _memory_ \--long after his death.  It is a heavy thing to bear alone.  He does not know if Maric’s own name was also him.  He never saw.  He never wondered.  

 

Loyalty, like love, does not waver.

 

. . .

 

Dwarves did not have Names.

 

Oghren prefers it that way.  It gives him chills to think of--carrying the burden of knowing something you ought not to--in the same way all that Fade stuff does, the way the sky does when he thinks he’s about to fall into it.

 

 _Just not right,_ he grumbles to himself, and sloshes the contents of another tankard of the family brew into his mouth.

 

He thinks of his failures, of his failed _families_ , and repeats it to himself, again.

 

He drinks until he’s sure he knows which thing he’s talking about.

. . .

 

Zevran has never had a name.  Like the Circle of Ferelden’s Magi, he had his skin wrent with magic when he was bought by the Crows--but even as the Masters did so, they laughed and mocked him, because he had already told them during the hours of torture beforehand that the skin they planned to tarnish was bare.

 

He stares at the unseemly blankness of his skin at night and, unbidden, his mind wanders to--

 

The lack of a name seems fitting.

 

. . .

 

Shale.

 

Shale is stone.  Shale is rock.  Occasionally, things scratch the surface of Shale’s mainstay skin, but Shale knows how to buff it out.  Shale has done so a thousand times, between battles and menial chores.  Shale is stone and rock and magic and Shale is Shale and no other name belongs.  When Shale hears the fleshy things obsess over names scratched into _their_ \--into **its** \-- _their?--_ **_her_ ** _\--_ skin it brings nothing.

 

Not even the salt or the stone of memories long past.

 

Shale is certain.

 

Occasionally, things scratch the surface of ~~**_her_ **~~ Shale’s skin, but they, like the memories, can be buffed out.

 

. . .

 

Dog (Bonus)

 

A dog’s life is far more simple.    _Names are inconsequential to dogs_ , the mabari hears the woman who smells like dark spells and grand, twisting trees say one day, _they’ll answer to anything._

 

The ensuing argument is more stilted than usual.

 

Names are inconsequential.

 

A mabari is smart enough to speak, but wise enough not to.  A human is not.

 

( _Just who is she trying to convince?_ )

**Author's Note:**

> Shrugs deeply and forever.
> 
> Your choice as to whether Morrigan and Alistair are soulmates because of the Old God Baby dealio or because I secretly want to ship them. Completely your choice.
> 
> Also hooray for blink and you'll miss it nods to Lore. (Weak laughter fades into the distance.)
> 
> I just realized that the "only you and your soulmate can see your identifying mark" stipulation does not largely come into play here. Again, oops.


End file.
